HSBC Platinum
KeepFree forever — but HSBC charges it two points per mile where TravelOne pays one.
a year at ₹40,000 a month, after the fee
Skip the arithmetic — the board, ranked → · nothing to sign up for
What it's worth to you, after the fee
Welcome: 2,000 reward points on ₹5,000 of spend within 30 days of card issuance, plus a 3-month Swiggy One membership, a voucher worth up to ₹500 for Amazon Pay, Zomato or Swiggy on activation, and a ₹250 Amazon eGift Card for a video-verified online application
Priced on the everyday mix — 30% groceries · 10% utilities · 20% travel · 6% fuel · 34% everything else — with this card's published category rules applied: it earns nothing on utilities and fuel here, so that spend is dropped, not paid at the headline, and stops pacing milestones and the waiver. Plus milestones, minus the fee. No accelerator credit — the ranking model on /compare adds ~20% of spend at the card's best accelerator, so its ₹ for this card reads higher.
How these numbers are computed — and why the rankings show a bigger one →
Spend tiers, milestones and fee waivers included, at our house ₹/point. Portal and category multipliers can push higher — run your exact number →
Pays from the first rupee
At ₹1,000 a month — ₹12,000 a year — on the everyday mix this card returns ₹100 gross (earn ₹100) against its ₹0 fee = ₹100 net — at or above ₹0 from the first rung we price. The ladder runs in ₹1,000 steps to ₹1,00,000 a month and ₹10,000 steps to ₹5,00,000; figures are rounded to the hundred, and the accelerator is never credited.
3 notes on the card itself: how it is issued · the network variants · why it ranks #75
Why #75 Held above what the score now says, and the gap is the point. Correcting the transfer grid on 2026-08-23 halved this card's rate (1.33% → 0.67%) and sent its ranking score down by more than a hundred places on the day, but rankingValue prices EARN and this card's whole case is that it costs nothing: a free card that reaches twenty airline and hotel programmes at all is worth more to a first-time collector than a better rate behind a ₹4,999 fee. Ranked as the free on-ramp it is. The day HSBC gives it a fee, this note stops applying.
Best real exit: Accor Live Limitless (ALL) at ₹1.07/pt (2:1 transfer, above house value).
The take
A lifetime-free card whose points reach a twenty-route transfer stable is a rare thing, and this is the only one HSBC India sells. The tariff sheet prints NIL against joining and annual for both the primary and the add-on card, and it earns 2 reward points per ₹150. Then read the transfer grid on this card's OWN rewards page, because it is not the grid TravelOne gets: where TravelOne moves 1 point into 1 mile at Air India, Etihad, British Airways, Qatar and Singapore Airlines, the Platinum moves two — and three into United, four into Turkish and Hainan, ten into a Shangri-La point. So the 1.33 points per ₹100 that land on the statement are 0.67% once they become miles, and 0.67% is what we rank. On a card that costs nothing that is still an argument: the routes are the same twenty, and this is the cheapest way to start a balance that can reach an airline at all. It is simply half the rate the fee-paying HSBC cards get, and anyone quoting you 1:1 off the TravelOne page is quoting the wrong card. Book hotels, flights or car hire through HSBC's Travel with Points portal and the point count goes up to six times the base — 12 RP per ₹150, which the same 2:1 grid turns into about 4% of value, and that is the accelerator that justifies calling it a travel card at all. Now the limits, and they are not small. There is no lounge access whatsoever — not on the product page, not in the tariff sheet — so this card gets you no further than the gate. Forex is the full 3.5%, which means the points you earn abroad cost you more than they are worth. And the Visa Signature furniture is thinner than it sounds: two complimentary domestic seat selections a year on MakeMyTrip and 15% back into a MakeMyTrip wallet on Indian hotel stays with a promo code. Hold it as a free points-accumulation card that feeds a real transfer stable, and swipe something else at the duty-free counter.
Your renewal — keep, downgrade or cancel
This card is lifetime free. There is no fee due, no renewal to weigh, and nothing to cancel to save.
Keep, downgrade or cancel
nothing due at the anniversary · 5 spend bands
The charge ₹0 — lifetime free
At your spend
₹1,700 a year at ₹3,00,000 of annual spend
₹3,400 a year at ₹6,00,000 of annual spend
₹6,700 a year at ₹12,00,000 of annual spend
₹20,200 a year at ₹36,00,000 of annual spend
₹33,600 a year at ₹60,00,000 of annual spend
Everyday earn plus milestones, with no fee to subtract — the same model as the value panel above, so the two cannot disagree. run your exact spend →
The downgrade
HSBC publishes no document naming a card you can step down to, so we name none — an invented product change is a phone call you would waste. That leaves keep or cancel, and the numbers above are the whole of it.
What has changed under this card
- 23 Sep 2026 Axis EDGE brings Accor back, drops ITC, and adds Cathay, Miles & More and Hilton a program these points reach
- 15 Sep 2026 Wyndham splits its three flat free-night tiers into four a program these points reach
- 8 Sep 2026 Flying Blue splits award tickets into Light / Standard / Flex — a 25% rise for the same product a program these points reach
We price what is in force today — a change that has not happened yet is not in these numbers. the full archive for this card →
If you call to cancel
What the bank offers to keep you is the one fact this desk cannot compute. We are collecting those reports — dated, and only in aggregate — before publishing any: an offer one reader was made is not one you are owed. Called about this card? Tell us what they offered →
The desk publishes subscribable .ics feeds for the dates it knows — offer deadlines, devaluations, expiry audits. Your renewal date is not one of them: only your statement knows it.
What's good
- Lifetime free — NIL joining and NIL annual fee, on the primary and add-on cards alike
- 2 reward points per ₹150 into HSBC Reward Points, which reach Air India, Etihad, British Airways and Singapore Airlines — at 2 points per mile, not 1
- Up to 6× reward points on hotels, flights and car rentals through HSBC's Travel with Points portal
- 2,000 welcome points for ₹5,000 of spend in the first 30 days, plus a 3-month Swiggy One membership
Watch out
- The transfer grid on this card is HALF TravelOne's: 2 points per mile on the eleven partners TravelOne moves 1:1, 3:1 into United, 4:1 into Turkish and Hainan, 10:1 into Shangri-La
- NO lounge access of any kind — HSBC publishes none on the product page or in the tariff sheet
- Forex is 3.5%, so foreign spend costs more in markup than the 0.67% it earns back in miles
- The earn denominator is ₹150, not ₹100 — spend under ₹150 in a transaction and the maths rounds against you
- The MakeMyTrip 15% is a wallet credit, not cashback, and needs the VISASIGNATURE promo code
- Fuel gets a surcharge waiver and a contactless cashback whose amount HSBC does not publish on the page
What these points actually fly
You hold this — the numbers below are your own points.
These points feed 23 programmes that publish an award chart. Cheapest verified seat per cabin, priced in YOUR points with this card's own ratio already applied:
- Bengaluru → Colombo Economy 13,000 HSBC Reward Points via Avios (BA / Qatar / Finnair) at 2:1 the play
- Chennai → Colombo Business 28,000 HSBC Reward Points via Avios (BA / Qatar / Finnair) at 2:1 the play
- Mumbai → Delhi First 100,000 HSBC Reward Points via Air Canada Aeroplan at 4:1 (through Accor Live Limitless (ALL)) the play
What earns, what doesn't
13 sourced rules · 9 pay zero
- Fuel · excluded Zero reward points — HSBC's Rewards Programme exclusion table names 5541, 5983, 5172, 5542 and 5552, which is every code in this category. And a second clause closes the loophole from the other side: "For transactions eligible for surcharge waiver, reward points will not be awarded." The waiver itself runs on fuel purchases of ₹400–₹4,000, capped at ₹250 a calendar month, and is withheld for the first 90 days after card issuance
- Rent & property management · excluded Zero reward points — "Real Estate and Managers 6513". 7349 is not named, so the exclusion as written is narrower than the category, and the tariff sheet charges a separate 1% processing fee on rental payments
- Wallet loads · excluded Zero reward points — HSBC names only 6540, so 6539 and 6541 sit outside the exclusion as written
- Utilities (electricity/water/gas) · excluded Zero reward points — utilities head HSBC's exclusion table. Only MCC 4900 is named, so 4899 and 4816 are outside the exclusion as written
Where the miles go
20 programs
Ratios read card points : partner miles — 2:1 means 2 points become 1 mile. Never the other way round.
every HSBC route, side by side → · the HSBC Reward Points hub →
Lounge access
0 of 793 tracked doors
No lounge access. This card opens exactly 0 of 793 tracked lounge doors — board with the crowd, or find a card that doesn't →
Can you get it?
income, age and the route in
The cutoffs and the actual route in — not the "apply now" button, the door that opens.
Direct application — no invite list, no banking relationship required.
per the official HSBC MITC — figures marked (community) aren't in the PDF; the issuer won't say · filter the board by what you can get →
The fine print
7 of 7 MITC rows published
What the MITC actually says — the rates, fees and cutoffs the brochure skips.
One tariff sheet covers Platinum and Live+ in side-by-side columns, which is what makes both readable against each other. Platinum prints NIL against joining, NIL against annual and NIL for add-ons — published zeros, not an unsourced blank — where Live+ pays ₹999 and ₹999. It also gets the LONGER free credit period of the two: 48 days against Live+'s 45, stated twice in the document ("The Interest free credit period could range from 48 days (Platinum Card) to 45 days (Cashback/Live+ Card)"). The forex line runs the other way: Platinum pays the full 3.5% where Live+ is carved out at 1.99%. Bounced cheque or dishonoured SI ₹500. Rental payments carry a 1% processing fee. Balance transfer 10.99%–15.99% a year plus a 1.5% processing fee, min ₹200. The sheet carries NO lounge entitlement for Platinum, and neither does the product page — the word does not appear on it. Eligibility also requires residence in one of HSBC's 21 named sourcing cities.
per the official HSBC MITC · reviewed 10 Jul 2026
What's changed for this card
8 dated changes
Devaluations and buffs that touch this card directly, its issuer, or the points and programs it earns and transfers to. Every one is dated here; the tracker carries each one's before → after and the write-up.
- 23 Sept 2026Axis EDGE brings Accor back, drops ITC, and adds Cathay, Miles & More and HiltonAccor and Marriott off the grid since 2 April 2026; Club ITC live; no Cathay, Miles & More or Hilton → Accor live at the punished rates; ITC removed; Cathay, Hilton and Miles & More live; Marriott still gone
Axis's own Travel EDGE terms, re-read 25 September 2026, already show the grid that went live on 23 September. Accor ALL is back, and not at the old Atlas 1:2: EDGE Miles convert at 2:1 (Olympus 1:2) and EDGE Rewards at 5:1, with Magnus for Burgundy at 5:2 and only Burgundy Private still at 5:4. Club ITC is off the table. Three partners are new. Cathay Asia Miles sits on that same punished grid. Hilton Honors is the ordinary one: EDGE Miles 1:2, EDGE Rewards 5:2, Burgundy 5:4. Lufthansa Miles & More is the exception on Atlas, which converts 1:1 there while every other standard airline on that card is 1:2; the EDGE Rewards side of Miles & More is the ordinary 5:2. Marriott stays removed. Qatar Privilege Club was already back. Flying Blue, Air India and Qantas moved into Group A, which is the capped group. The Axis Rewards credit card's Amex network is advertised as joining-fee and annual-fee nil for a limited period; there is no separate Amex variant on this board, so that offer is not modelled as a fee change.
- 15 Sept 2026Wyndham splits its three flat free-night tiers into four
- 8 Sept 2026Flying Blue splits award tickets into Light / Standard / Flex — a 25% rise for the same product
- 1 Sept 2026HSBC Live+ switches on its international lounge visit, and adds a 1GB global eSIM
- 1 Sept 2026HSBC's RuPay Platinum welcome suite lapses — ₹500 cashback, EazyDiner and the UPI ₹250 all end together
- 1 Sept 2026HSBC's RuPay Cashback welcome suite lapses — ₹500 cashback, EazyDiner and the UPI ₹250 all end together
- 31 Aug 2026HSBC's 0% forex window on the RuPay Cashback card closes
- 25 Aug 2026Vietnam Airlines Lotusmiles opens a broad SkyTeam status match — up to Elite Plus
Every HSBC change we've dated → 9 events since 1987, 6 of them nerfs — worst year 2026.
Verified against HSBC's own documents on · the net-annual-value engine, at our house ₹/point
Every document behind this page — 3 of them, each with the day we read it
- official Product page — INR0 joining and INR0 annual fee, 2 reward points per INR150, and up to 6× on hotels, flights and car rentals booked through Travel with Points
- official This card's own transfer grid — 2 reward points to 1 mile on eleven airlines, 3 to 1 into United, 4 to 1 into Turkish and Hainan, and 10 to 1 into Shangri-La Circle
- official Shared Platinum / Live+ tariff sheet — Platinum joining NIL and annual NIL, and 3.5% on foreign currency where Live+ pays 1.99%